Companies that aren’t working on sustainable solutions today, will be in trouble soon

Sarah, what is the success of Go Forest?

I think we offer projects with a tangible outcome, and it’s easy for companies to step in, because we have ready-made sustainability solutions for them. Companies can also follow the impact they make by planting trees via an impact dashboard. It’s all very transparent. We receive requests from a wide range of people, including CEOs and business owners, but also marketing managers, HR managers and CSR managers.

There’s a social dimension to Go Forest as well. Can you explain?

We think it’s important that our tree-planting projects create the greatest possible impact. This includes creating jobs for the local communities, for example, but also providing education to children or farmers on nature restoration, or the creation of food forests. We could perfectly well use drones to plant trees, but we choose not to. We want local people to do it, so they benefit from it as well.

“We all use plastics, so we all have an impact on the climate.”

Go Forest has a low threshold. But is planting trees not distracting companies from tackling their own impact reduction?

We definitely don’t intend to distract them. What we see is that tree-planting projects often work as a motivator and an accelerator. For many companies, planting trees is a first sustainability project, especially with smaller SMEs. Then they see what an impact they can make, and they’re inspired to do more. That’s the beauty of Go Forest. But we just as well have companies that are already doing a lot. Those companies see tree-planting as something in parallel with other sustainability efforts.

But I understand the danger of greenwashing, I like to call it treewashing. The fact is: planting trees is not greenwashing. It’s the extent of transparency in how you communicate about it all. That’s why we also offer our online credibili-tree tool. It’s a way to calculate your recommended minimum number of trees, in accordance with your industry and number of employees.

“Tree-planting works as an accelerator for other sustainability projects.”

How do you feel about working together with B.I.G. Yarns, a company that uses plastics as raw material?

We are all consumers, we all use plastics. So, we all have an impact on the climate. Of course, we have a list of companies we do not tend to work with. But there’s a great midfield of companies – about 80% of companies – who are aware of the impact they make on the climate, but want to give something back. But I admit it’s not always an easy decision to make.

Do you think the industry is doing enough to reduce its climate impact?

I don’t think so. Unlike B.I.G. Yarns, many companies are not intrinsically motivated and are just waiting to see what climate change obligations will come their way. But I think that those who are not proactively working on climate-friendly solutions already, will be in trouble soon. Many companies seem to think they have the luxury of an easy start, that they can take climate actions in due course. But what about the past? The CO2 we emitted 30 years ago, that’s what we are feeling today. We should be more aware of that retardant effect.